Typically, cold smoking techniques involve curing a meat or seafood with salt and/or sugar and applying hardwood smoke at ambient temperature generated from expensive hardwood. More modern cold smoking techniques involve some filtering of the hardwood smoke and temperature control of the smoking chamber. Some recently developed smoking techniques involve no direct application of actual wood smoke but rely on a curing and flavoring process using smoke extract or liquid smoke and result in a cured and smoke flavored but fresh-appearing product.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,116,223 teaches smoking foods using a system capable of producing desired temperatures and humidity conditions using a wet bulb thermostat to control smoke temperature and air flow and a suitable filter at the outlet of the smoke producer. One shortcoming associated to this method is it uses a large volume of hardwood to achieve the desired results.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,013,567 teaches a method of smoke generation for smoke-curing foods in which the smoke is generated using the top burning method and is not applied to the food to be smoked until a layer of charcoal covers the smoke generating material. The smoke is filtered through this layer of charcoal, described as a selective filter, to remove detrimental substances out of the smoke. One shortcoming associated with this method is that it relies on multiple re-fillable smoke generators.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,484,619 teaches the smoking of raw fish and meat to sterilize and prevent decomposition and discoloration without loss of freshness. The smoked fish and meat pick up agreeable taste and flavor, and remain as wholesome as fresh ones when kept at easily obtainable cold-storage or freezing temperatures, even during long transportation. The smoke generated by burning a smoking material at 250° to 400° C. is passed through a filter to remove tar. The smoke retaining ingredients, exerting highly preservative and sterilizing actions passed through the filter, are cooled to between 0° and 5° C. in a cooling unit. Fish or meat is processed by exposure to the smoke at the extra-low temperature thus obtained. The smoking material disclosed are the traditionally used woods such as oak, Japanese oak, beech, cherry and alder. One shortcoming associated to the use of these woods is that they are not readily available in many regions and if they are, they tend to be expensive to use in the smoking process.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,972,401 teaches a tasteless super-purified smoke manufactured to treat seafood and meat to preserve the freshness, color, texture, and natural flavor, particularly after the food is frozen and thawed. The smoke is generated by burning an organic smoking material at 260 to 571° C. in a smoke generator. It is then passed through a precipitation filtering tower comprised of filters of ice, cloth, and activated carbon to remove taste imparting, and carcinogenic particulates and vapors. The super-purified smoke is then stored and aged in a temporary pressure pot or in canisters for treatment at the same time or at another place and time. The super-purified smoke is used to treat seafood or meat in plastic bags at temperatures between its variable freezing point and 7.8° C. for twelve to forty-eight hours, or until the desired effect is achieved. The product is then frozen, stored for up to one year, and quick- or slow thawed with little degradation of the treated seafood or meat. The process disclosed preserves the seafood without imparting any detectable taste or odor. One shortcoming associated to this method is that there is no flavor imparted into the meat or seafood as any flavor is filtered from the smoke to ensure that no flavor or detectable taste or odor is imparted.
A need therefore exists for providing a method and/or apparatus for curing and/or cold smoking meat and/or seafood that imparts a pleasing taste while reducing the reliance on expensive hardwood for imparting taste.